No die-hard thriller, this

Forgive me all you Die Hard fans, but Good Day To Die Hard ain’t no die-hard thriller. And, to make it worse, Bruce Willis has crossed that thin line which separates machoism from chauvinism with his fifth instalment of John McClane. You do want to root for John McClane, but he makes it so very difficult.

One thing becomes very clear, when a legend is projected out of proportion, it ends up looking very silly indeed. In Good Day To Die Hard, John McClane comes across as a ‘spoilt’ American. Given that, even the supposed menace of a dancing Russian villain falls flat.

But Good Day To Die Hard is a hardcore action film, alright. The kind where countless super luxury cars are flattened, machine guns rage non-stop, weaponised choppers shoot pointblank and buildings crumble. There’s even radio-active Chernobyl thrown in for good measure. With all that going, who cares if there’s a plot or not, right?

Except, we are talking John McClane, the character that made Bruce Willis. So when he walks into trouble when it’s blazing, and falls into situation without really much effort or thought, boy does he disappoint! This time round, we have the ‘prodigal’ son (played by Jai Courtney) that he has gone all the way to Russia to bring back home, like the good dad that he is. But turns out his son is in the middle of a CIA operation. John McClane, of course, is least bothered by that. He just heaves a sigh of relief that his son is not peddling drugs and joins him in action. Together they browbeat the baddies, save the world from nuclear threat. Yipeee.

When the action is put on hold — en route Chernobyl to catch up with the baddies in their choppers before they could getaway with the incriminating evidence, for instance, which, by the way, they reach unbelievably fast considering Russia is vast and they go there by car — we are treated to father-son bonding. Honestly, the director could have done well with some more action instead — there’s still scope for bombed out trains and bridges. For heaven’s sake, they supposedly stole Chechens’ cache of weapons and car to get to climax!